Category Archives: Church and State

Georgia congressman Paul Broun (Rep.) does not like science. In fact, as reported by TPM, he really does not like science so much that when speaking at the recent Liberty Baptist Church Sportsman’s Banquet he informed the group:

“All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell. And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior.”

He, along with Todd Akin (who, in his spare time, invents facts about rape), sits on the United States House Committee on Science, Space and Technology. Broun, a medical doctor with a B.S. in Chemistry, continued:

“You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth. I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says.”

To conclude he summed up how he makes public policy decisions:

“What I’ve come to learn is that it’s the manufacturer’s handbook, is what I call it. It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society. And that’s the reason as your congressman I hold the holy Bible as being the major directions to me of how I vote in Washington, D.C., and I’ll continue to do that.”

Verdict

As reported later by The Huffington Post Broud’s reelection campaign later defended his remarks by explaining that they were “Off the record” and, despite his clear and unequivocal explanation that they informed his public policy decisions, that his comments were “about his personal beliefs regarding religious issues.”

Broud has a complete lack of understanding of both science and the role of a secular government. Worse, he is clearly immensely proud of these flaws. He is charged with Grand Dickory in the First Degree. Furthermore we sentence him to live without the benefits of science until he decides to respect it.

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In the first of what we fear will be many posts regarding the tragic shootings in Colorado (as reported by MSNBC, CNN, Fox News and all other major news outlets) we would like to introduce you to Louie Gohmert, a sad, angry little congressman from Texas.

“You know what really gets me, as a Christian, is to see the ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs, and then some senseless crazy act of a derelict takes place.” … “Some of us happen to believe that when our founders talked about guarding our virtue and freedom, that that was important,” he said. “Whether it’s John Adams saying our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people … Ben Franklin, only a virtuous people are capable of freedom, as nations become corrupt and vicious they have more need of masters. We have been at war with the very pillars, the very foundation of this country.”

(While he is correct that Adams was quite pro-religion Franklin most assuredly was not. However both men were major, outspoken proponents of the separation of church and state; a fact that clearly eludes representative Gohmert.)

In a rambling conclusion Gohmert intimates that the recent challenges to the Separation of Church and State may be preventing God from intervening in situation like this:

“People say … where was God in all of this? We’ve threatened high school graduation participations, if they use God’s name, they’re going to be jailed … I mean that kind of stuff. Where was God? What have we done with God? We don’t want him around. I kind of like his protective hand being present.”

While a defense can (and most likely will) be made that the congressmen never actually related today’s events to his beliefs it’s very difficult for reasonable people not to take that message away from his comments.

Verdict

Yes, blowhards will be blowhards, but to Gohmert decided to use this tragedy for his political gain before the bodies even had a chance to cool – in fact less than 9 hours from the murders. For that he easily earns a sentence of Federal Felony Dickory in the First Degree.

His comments relating the founding fathers are true, but misleading and self-serving, which adds an additional charge of Douchbaggery in the Third Degree.

“I actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America’s Founding Fathers’ religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools.” and “I liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school.” Later she added, “Unfortunately it will not be limited to the Founders’ religion.”

While the founders religious preferences are still debatable it’s very likely that many (if not most) would be very uncomfortable with the evangelism of today. It’s also true that many of the most well-known and most respected of the founding father’s (Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Adams, Wilson, Morris, Madison, and Washington for example) are also those most critical of religion.

Jefferson, of course, is credited with coining the term “separation of church and state” in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between church and State.”

Representative Hodges clearly needs to review her history. Finally she ends: “We need to ensure that it does not open the door to fund radical Islam schools. There are a thousand Muslim schools that have sprung up recently. I do not support using public funds for teaching Islam anywhere here in Louisiana.”

Verdict

For Representative Hodges clear ignorance of her own history and the US Constitution she easily earns a charge of Dumbassery in the First Degree. For her blatant (and illegal) favoritism of her own religion she also garners an additional charge of Dickory in the Second Degree.

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Offenders highlighted on SadPolitics can be charged with one or more of following in various degrees:

Dumbassery: Ideas or statements that are just patently stupid or so well debunked that no honest individual could possibly present them as factual. Dumbbasses are either liars or idiots (sometimes both).

Douchebaggery: Things that are technically true, but presented so far out of context as to be meaningless to the conversation at hand. Douchebags will often “lawyer” their way out of arguments.

Dickory: This is just, for lack of a better word, being an asshole. Dickory makes up for a lack of substance with volume and bullying.